SUICIDE BOND

The singer also reveals that he and Hutchence had discussed suicide before the INXS star was found hanged in his hotel room...

BONO has said U2’s recent single ‘STUCK IN A MOMENT (YOU CAN’T GET OUT OF)’ was inspired by the mysterious death of INXS singer MICHAEL HUTCHENCE, and that the pair discussed suicide prior to his death and decided it was “pathetic”.

Speaking to Rolling Stone magazine, Bono said that he and Hutchence, a close friend of the U2 singer, had discussed suicide before he was found hanged in a Sydney hotel room in 1997. He said: “We discussed suicide a few times and we both agreed how pathetic it was.” He added that the pair “kinda promised each other” neither would ever kill themselves.

Bono is convinced that Hutchence’s death was suicide, a ruling always contested by his late girlfriend, Paula Yates, who maintained he died as a result of a bizarre sex act going wrong.

Bono continued: “I’d love to believe that he went out on some spectacular sexual manoeuvre, but knowing the state of him at the time, I don’t think so. But I’m sure of this, if he had lasted half an hour longer, he would be alive now. He couldn’t see out of that half an hour… and a friend of his told me that he’d brought up our conversation a few days before that.”

Bono also revealed that ‘Stuck In A Moment…’ was inspired by these events. He said: “That song is an argument. It’s a row between mates. You’re kinda trying to wake them up out of an idea. In my case it’s a row I didn’t have while he was alive.

“I feel the biggest respect I could pay to him was not to write some stupid soppy fucking song, so I wrote a really tough, nasty little number…slapping him around the head. And I’m sorry, but that’s how it came out of me.”

Since Hutchence’s death, INXS have continued as a band, playing their most recent show on New Year’s Eve in Adelaide with new singer Jon Stevens.